


Non-Disclosure Agreement

by generally



Category: Tiny Meat Gang (Band)
Genre: Anxiety, Cody wears a polo, Drunk Sex, High School, M/M, Noel be like "existence is pain", Noel is afraid of children, Oblivious Cody, Spock is there too, Teacher AU, Teen boys acting like asshats, You're Welcome, alcohol mention, and glasses, cursing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-03
Updated: 2020-01-08
Packaged: 2021-02-27 04:20:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22080967
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/generally/pseuds/generally
Summary: Cody’s expression cracks into a toothy grin at the small victory of making Noel break. His nose crinkles a little bit, along with the laughter lines at the corners of his eyes. It’s actually pretty cute.And then it clicks in his stupid lizard brain.Holy mother of God.-Noel has a new job teaching a high school tech class, except his co-teacher is a dude he may or may not have drunkenly boned down with before. And the dude definitely doesn’t remember any of it.
Relationships: Cody Ko & Noel Miller, Cody Ko/Noel Miller
Comments: 27
Kudos: 144





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> As a new teacher, it's my sworn duty to write a high school teacher AU. Sorry, I don't make the rules.  
> More tags to follow as chapters get added!

Here’s the thing about kids: Noel is shit with them.

It’s not that he hates them or that he’s “childfree” or whatever. He just doesn’t interact real well with them. Like, he’ll try to be nice and make conversation with his little cousins at family parties and they’ll just stare at him like he’s got three heads. It’s almost like kids speak an entirely different language, and Noel’s stuck flipping through a pocket-sized Child to English dictionary in order to keep up. And don’t even get him started on those bitch-ass little TikTok and Instagram tweens trying to act like they’re grown and shit. It’s all totally beyond him. Sure, he was embarrassing at that age too, but Jesus, at least he wasn’t posting videos of himself _crip walking_.

So why on God’s green earth is he now subjecting himself to leaving all his software development training behind in favor of working with those very same bitch-ass tweens? For seven hours a day?

Long answer: the firm in Santa Clarita he’d been working at since he was 23 laid off a quarter of their dev team almost seven months ago, the biggest downsize they’ve done in over thirty years. Which, go figure, included him.

That was a hard fucking hit for Noel. He really loved that job. Good schedule, great pay, good management, cool coworkers (two or three of whom grew to be his actual homies). They even paid for him to get his master’s. So when he found his ass on the curb at the end of January, he didn’t really know what to do.

He applied everywhere he could think of for weeks and weeks, and he means _everywhere._ But he’d been at the same game for too long, not really picking up a lot of new skills or immersing himself in the latest dev trends, and his two degrees made him overqualified for most of the positions he wanted. His email inbox was filled with more rejections than an ugly dude at the club.

So come March, when rent was due and his savings were sucked dry and his only remaining choices were freelancing or filing for unemployment, he chose the former. And he stuck with it all spring and summer. It was fine. Had to turn down some commissions because the clients were asking him to code some advanced shit he didn’t know how to do, which bruised his ego a little bit, but he got by. It put food in his fridge and he was able to keep his apartment. _Could be worse_ became his mantra for nearly half a year.

Then, one lazy Saturday morning in early August, he gets a call from his dad in Santa Monica. It’s worth mentioning that his dad only calls when someone in the family’s getting engaged or getting put in the dirt.

“Just think, it would be perfect,” he’s saying cheerfully, as Noel feels a big-ass migraine coming on. “The stipend is good, no teacher cert required, and you only have to show up three days a week. No pasa nada.”

Noel’s dad taught high school Spanish for 25 years and now works for the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District, coordinating the hiring committees for new teachers. He always secretly hoped that Noel would grow up to be a teacher too, even as Noel consistently showed utter apathy toward his own education. But it looks like his dad might finally be getting his wish, because he needs to find someone to help teach some fucking high school tech class.

“Don’t you think this is a little nepotism-y of you?” Noel says, screwing his eyes shut and sinking further into his ratty second-hand couch. “I’ve never taught a child anything in my whole life. Surely there’s more qualified people out there who actually _know_ how to teach code.”

“You’d be surprised. They’ve been wanting to make this class co-taught for three or four years now. We’ve only had a few takers and all their interviews were just disasters.”

“And you think _I’ll_ be any better?” Noel shoots back with a bitter laugh. “This is crazy, Dad. I don’t know the first thing about education.”

“You can learn. You’ve always been a fast learner.” ( _Yeah, sure,_ Noel wants to say, but he’s actually kinda right. He learns shit quickly when he cares about it. He used to tear through fantasy novels as a kid like they were comic strips.) “And didn’t you hear me? You’re not _really_ the teacher, Mr. Ko is. This is his sixth year teaching this class. And he’s popular, the students love him.” Noel can feel this turning into a sales pitch from hell. “He has them build little robots, do iMovie videos, design roller coasters on the computers, stuff like that.”

He raises an eyebrow. “That…actually sounds pretty cool.”

“I tell you, Noel, you have to trust your father. Anyway, what was I saying?...oh, yes. So the PTA has been pushing for computer coding to be added to the curriculum, but this teacher doesn’t know how. So you’re just there to help with the coding. Think of it as a...as a temp job!”

_Not helping, Dad._

Noel exhales slowly through his nose. “And you _swear_ I’d just be there to teach code? _Basic_ code? This guy’s not gonna make me teach physics or Pascal or anything?”

“Swear on your mother’s life.”

“Dark.”

“And you can keep even doing your freewheeling on the side if you want.”

Cue obligatory “okay boomer” eye roll. “Free _lancing,_ Dad. It’s called freelancing.”

“Yeah, yeah. So you’ll consider?”

Noel grumbles into the receiver, making a big show about it, but in reality he’s already made up his mind. He’s pushing 30 and barely feels like he’s done anything meaningful in his 20s at all. Sure, he loved his old job, but when push comes to shove, he was designing software for old white exec guys to use. At least with this, he’ll be giving back to the community in a bigger way...sort of.

“Yeah. Yeah, sure. I’ll do it.”

“Muy bien. I knew you’d say yes,” his dad practically gloats into the phone, sounding way too pleased with himself. “I mean, how could you not? It’s an offer you can’t refuse!”

Noel smiles a little. “Wouldn’t go that far. But thanks, Dad. Talk to you soon.”

“Okay, I’ll forward you the details. Watch your email! ‘ta luego.” And he hangs up.

Noel lays there with his phone still against his ear for a moment, then tosses it towards his feet. It lands right on his ankle bone and he winces.

Short answer: he needs the fucking money.

He _really_ hopes this Mr. Ko dude works well with incompetence.

* * *

The Monday of the first week of school is a teacher in-service day, which means he doesn’t have to interact with any children yet, thank God. His morning consisted of showering, spending way too much time on his hair, contemplating way too many combinations of slacks and button-ups, digging his dad’s old leather briefcase out of the closet that probably hasn’t seen the sun since 1998, and discovering that what should’ve been a 25 minute commute to Palm Bay High School actually takes 45 minutes in rush hour. He rolls up to the faculty lot nearly fifteen minutes late, but the secretary at the front office doesn’t seem to give a single shit as she scans Noel’s driver’s license and hands him a visitor sticker and a map of the school.

As he helplessly wanders the huge outdoor campus searching for the tech lab, a passing woman in a sharp-looking purple pantsuit notices him and asks if he needs help finding anything. By the time he follows her directions to the whitewashed wooden building at the edge of school grounds, with a big sign reading “TECHNOLOGY LAB” in blue and yellow lettering, he’s 25 minutes late for his meeting with this guy. _Awesome,_ he gripes to himself as he grabs the metal door handle, turns and pulls.

The door is heavier than he expects – _Jesus fuck, I need to go back to the gym, these scrawny pubescent weaklings probably do this every damn day, no problem_ – but his internal monologue gets muffled as soon as he gets a good look at the interior of the place. It’s huge, first of all, and very obviously a brand new building. The sprawling linoleum floor is dotted with about a dozen clover cubicles, each meticulously-supplied workspace housing a nice desktop Mac with a gently flickering screensaver. Beyond the open floor, there’s a lecture area cut up into the wall, with four risers of university-style desk chairs facing a big projector screen. He spies what he thinks is a 3D printer in the back corner, and a ginormous set of filing cabinets in the adjacent corner.

He literally can’t believe his eyes. This place is nicer than his old office, and those dudes had _hella_ paper _._

Mr. Ko is nowhere to be found. Noel’s almost scared to walk around in here, like his broke-ass feet don’t even deserve to touch this floor. “Hello?” he calls out. His voice bounces off the tiled walls. Nice acoustics.

He steps past a cubicle block, and a large elevated platform against the opposite wall comes into view. The platform’s about a foot high, and there’s two large desks perched up there side by side, each with its own Mac sitting on top. One desk is cluttered, the other is bare.

There’s a guy sitting at the cluttered desk. Stocky white dude, light brown hair, round-framed glasses, strong jaw. Good-looking, although not Noel’s usual type. He usually goes for tall, toned gym rat types; this dude looks like he just got plucked out of a UCLA frat house and plopped down in the chair.

He meets Noel’s eyes right away, and his eyebrows raise expectantly. “Oh hey, you must be Noel,” he says with a smile, stepping down from the desk platform and holds out his hand. “I’ve heard a lot about you. Great to meet you.”

First thing Noel realizes is that he came _way_ overdressed. While he was stressing for 20 minutes this morning about which formal dress shirt to wear with which pair of dress pants, this fool showed up to work in _jeans and a polo._ Of course.

“Likewise, man.” Noel takes Mr. Ko’s hand and shakes it, noting the outline of his bicep cutting down from his shirt sleeve. He may not look like a gym rat, but the dude clearly lifts. “Hey, I wanna apologize for getting here so late. Traffic was crazy and this whole place is a maze.”

Mr. Ko waves him off with a little flick of his hand. “Don’t sweat it. First day,” he replies breezily. He’s got maybe half an inch on Noel in height, but the hair makes it seem like more. It’s long on top and short on the sides, like he’s trying to look five years younger, but he pulls it off. “And you’re right, this place _is_ a maze, but you’ll get your bearings soon.”

“Uh…cool,” Noel replies stupidly. And because he _is_ stupid, he says the first stupid thing that pops into his brain. “This is the nicest classroom I’ve ever been in. I mean, if my high school had a tech classroom like this, I probably never would’ve left.”

Mr. Ko flashes him a polite, closed-mouth smile. “Yeah, the school board allocates a _lot_ of funds for us. You know, with the whole STEM education push and all. So I make use of it the best I can.” He gestures vaguely towards the cubicles, looking a little sheepish about it. “What was the setup like at your last school?”

Noel just kind of stands there and blinks for a sec, not fully comprehending the question. “I, uh…there wasn’t. I mean, this is my first, uh, my first teaching job.” _Real casual, Miller._

Mr. Ko looks just as surprised as him. “For real? Well hey, man, that’s awesome. My admin told me you were a code _master_ , so I’m sure you’ll be great.”

Noel lets out a carefully-crafted chuckle to disguise his abject horror. What the hell did his dad tell these people about him? “Well, wouldn’t exactly call myself a _master,_ you know, but I’m okay. I worked in software engineering for six years, and I’ve been freelancing apps and web design and stuff for the past few months or so.”

Recounting the Sparknotes version of his disappointing year stung a little for Noel, but Mr. Ko’s mouth is agape in awe. “Dude, that’s _so_ tight,” is all he says, in the same way a fifteen-year-old might talk about the graphics on a new game.

Noel raises an eyebrow at him, amused. “You talk to your students like that?” he asks, in the same tone he might use to say _you kiss your mother with that mouth?_

“Well…sometimes,” Mr. Ko admits, and the sheepish look is back. “Once they’re juniors or seniors and I know them pretty well.”

“Ah.” Noel still isn’t sure whether this whole thing is a fever dream or not. “Y’know, that reminds me. I, uh, I didn’t catch your first name.”

“Oh, it’s Cody,” he answers, and Noel is internally screaming because of _course_ this motherfucker’s name would be Cody. “Last name Kolodziejzyk, but everyone ‘round here calls me Mr. Ko.”

“Ko-lo-gee-check?”

“Gesundheit,” Cody deadpans, and it catches Noel so off-guard that he actually laughs out loud. _Guy’s got jokes,_ he thinks.

Cody’s expression cracks into a toothy grin at the small victory of making Noel break. His nose crinkles a little bit, along with the laughter lines at the corners of his eyes. It’s actually pretty cute.

And then it clicks in his stupid lizard brain.

_Holy mother of God._

He’s hit with a violently vivid flashback - fluorescent club bathroom lighting; the tequila aftertaste in the back of his throat; cold unidentified moisture seeping through his jeans as he drops down to his knees on the floor; the soft skin of the lower back he’s digging his fingernails into; the choked-off gasps coming from above him –

“Dude, are you okay?”

Noel snaps out of it as Cody waves a hand in front of his face, looking concerned.

He fake-coughs, trying to play off the excruciating alarm bells going off in his head. “Yeah, yeah. Sorry.” _Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck Jesus FUCKING Christ._ “I’m good.”

“Cool,” says Cody, unnoticing of Noel’s internal freakout. Cody runs a hand through his stupid frat bro hair – _THAT HAND HAS TOUCHED YOUR DICK,_ Noel’s conscience screams at him – and claps Noel on the shoulder. “Alright, first things first: let’s go to the front office and get you an ID badge. You know, since you're the real deal now.”

Noel immediately tenses up at the touch, his mind’s eye veering right back into the danger zone. No, this _has_ to be a fever dream. “I- yeah. Sounds good, man.”

Cody shoots him a puzzled look. “You sure you’re feeling okay? Need to step outside for a sec?”

It occurs to Noel just then that this fool definitely doesn’t remember what happened at all. Or if he does, he needs to quit teaching and take up acting immediately. Man, ignorance really must be fuckin’ bliss.

Finally, in a moment of sense and clarity (which is rare for Noel), he takes a deep breath and does what he does best: takes hold of whatever the fuck is going on in his brain right now and represses the living hell out of it.

“I’m good. Thanks, though. Let’s go.”

It's gonna be a long year.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow I really did my mans Spock dirty in this chapter. Spock stans I apologize
> 
> Thanks so much for all the love on the first chapter! Comments and kudos mean a bunch :-)

Noel spends that whole first day swallowing his pride and being escorted around by Cody, signing paperwork and securing clearances and getting his own keys to the building. Teaching is a _lot_ more paperwork than he thought. Cody walks him around campus, pointing out different buildings and dishing out interesting school facts like a college tour guide. He even sits in on the new faculty orientation meeting with him.

“Haven’t you been teaching here for a minute?” he asks Cody as they sit down next to each other at the conference table. “Go do what you need to do, man. I’ll come find you after.”

“It’s cool,” Cody says with a slight shrug. “I’m all done with setup anyway. And this is usually the only time I ever hear about new policies and procedure changes and stuff.” He nonchalantly props his elbow up on the back of his chair, and Noel sits there and wills himself very, very strongly not to think about Cody’s biceps again. “Communication on admin’s end can be ass sometimes.”

“Ah, delightful.”

The meeting drags on for almost two hours, and by the end of it Noel’s head is spinning like crazy from the info dump. When they’re dismissed by the vice principal - a forty-something white guy who just _reeks_ of “hasn’t been able to sexually satisfy his wife in years” energy - it’s almost like Cody can tell that Noel’s overwhelmed as fuck because he gives him a couple quick taps to the shoulder blade with two fingers as he stands. “C’mon, let’s go back to the lab and I’ll show you how the 3-D printer works.”

Noel likes the sound of that.

“So what’s your background?” he asks later as Cody’s booting up the machine. “Where’d you go to school?”

“Duke. Originally for computer science but I wasn’t good enough with code to keep up. Switched to physics and I minored in media production.”

“Mm. So that’s why you needed me to come save your sorry ass, huh?”

“Ha ha, very funny. The curriculum coordinators have been bugging me for months trying to get me to add a coding unit to this class, and I kept telling them hey, if that’s what you want, you gotta get me the personnel. And they finally did,” he says, gesturing towards Noel with a weird little jerk of his elbow as he recalibrates the needle inside the printer.

“So they did.” Noel smiles a little as he watches Cody’s hands make work of the machine. “Why the minor in media? Seems a little out there.”

“I needed to add a minor or I would’ve had to graduate early. But I dunno, I guess I picked it ‘cause I’ve always been a wannabe film junkie.”

“Is that so?”

“Oh, yeah.”

“Hmm… Desert island movie. Go.”

“ _Crank_.”

“Damn, son, you didn’t skip a beat.”

“Hey, you asked, I answered.”

“Isn’t that the one where what’s his name- Jason Statham gets poisoned so he has to do a bunch of meth to like, keep his blood flowing or some shit?”

“The very same. It’s like _Unstoppable_ except it’s about a guy and not a train and it’s basically just a completely different movie.”

Noel snorts. “Poetic cinema.”

“What about you? And don’t go stealing my answer now.”

He ponders it for a sec. “Any film where everyone dies.”

“Oof,” Cody says, badly holding back a smile. “So _Trainspotting?_ ”

“Close. More like _Requiem For a Dream._ ”

“Oh, hell yeah, even better.” Cody exhales with a little _huff_ and runs a hand through his hair the same way he did earlier, eyes bright from smiling, and Noel has to grit his teeth and hold his own self-control at gunpoint for a sec. The moment passes.

“So have you ever made a movie before?”

“I wish. But like, my mom got me one of those shitty Sony camcorders for Christmas when I was in high school and I ran that thing into the _dirt._ ”

“ _Yo,_ same here, dog,” Noel laughs, and Cody breaks out into a giggling fit along with him. “I was running around the house making my brother do the _dumbest_ shit on camera with me. Drove my mom fuckin’ insane. I really thought I was gonna be the next Harold Ramis or something.”

“I mean, you still got time. Wasn’t he kinda old when he did Caddyshack? That was his…his _directorial debut,_ if I’m not mistaken,” Cody says, throwing on an exaggerated posh accent for that last bit.

“Was it really? Well shit, I turned 30 on the 19th. Just gotta fuck around for a few more years and then I’ll be in my bag.”

Cody looks back at him in earnest. “Hey, happy belated birthday. Over the hill.”

Noel scoffs, in part to cover up the warm feeling in his chest that’s pulling on his ribcage. “Bro, ‘over the hill’ is _fifty_ , not thirty. Jesus, as if I didn’t feel old enough already.”

“Oh my God, I’m a fucking idiot,” Cody manages to squeak out in between peals of laughter. “Sorry. I turn 29 in November. We’re both old.”

“Welcome to the club, geezer,” Noel says, holding out his fist. Cody touches it with his own and grins at him before turning his attention back to the printer.

So he and Cody are practically the same person. That’s cool. But he recognizes very quickly that this revelation is gonna make it real difficult to ignore the, ah, _situation_ at hand. Because he sure as shit isn’t gonna bring it up. After that meeting today, he knows he’d be hit with an HR violation faster than he can say “non-disclosure agreement.”

* * *

Let’s put down some context before we go any further, alright?

It was Fourth of July weekend, and he was out in downtown Hollywood with some homies. He was fresh off a breakup with his ex-girl – turns out some motherfucker saved under “James Big Dick” in her phone had been paying her some visits whenever Noel was out of town. So fuck that bitch. He’s here to dance, hang with his boys, and get fucking trashed.

For a while they take over a table near the dance floor, drinking and laughing and having a good time. He’s three rum and cokes deep when somebody buys a round of Cuervo shots for the table, and that’s where things start going off the rails.

An hour and two shots later, his friends are in a heated argument about who really killed Biggie and Tupac. Noel’s way too out of it to focus on the conversation, so he lets his eyes wander around the club. Across the way, he spots two dudes probably around his age standing around by the bar. One of them, with glasses and long-ass hair, looks like he got lost on his way to a My Little Pony convention. The other could pass for a long-lost Wahlberg brother, in a good way.

They look pretty chill, just talking and people-watching, and for some reason Noel’s drunk brain feels way more compelled to go talk to these two complete strangers than to keep listening to Marcus’s stupid theory that Tupac was actually shot by the FBI. He grabs his phone from off the table, almost dropping it, and starts heading for the bar. He registers faintly that his homies are heckling him for walking away, but he can’t find it in him to care right now. He’ll find them later.

He rolls up to the edge of the bar, about five feet away from Brony and Marky Mark, and orders a Modelo.

“Aww, for me? You shouldn’t have.”

Noel turns, bottle in hand. Marky Mark is smirking right at him, his own drink in one hand and the other in the front pocket of his jeans. He’s leaning up against a pillar, looking very cavalier.

“No problem,” Noel says, holding the beer out towards him as a joke. “I gotta warn you, though, it’s not very low-cal or low-carb. Might throw off your keto diet.”

Marky Mark throws his head back and laughs, and Noel’s eyes zero in right on the curves of muscle in his neck. “God, if only I could actually stick to a diet. I’m Cody.”

“Noel.”

“Nice. A little fruity, but I’ll take it.” Cody looks him up and down, throws a shameless wink at him. _Oh man,_ Noel thinks dimly, too tipsy and flattered to be offended.

“This is Spock, by the way,” Cody goes on to say, grabbing Brony by the shoulder.

“Hold up, hold up. Your name is _Spock?”_ Somehow that’s even funnier to Noel than if he were actually named Brony. “Your parents must fuckin’ hate you, man.”

“Nah, it’s a nickname,” says Spock, sounding defensive, and yeah, maybe that was a little harsh right out of the gate on Noel’s end.

Spock’s eyes go shifting back and forth between Cody and Noel before settling on Cody. “I, uh, I’m gonna go find Nick. Later.”

“Later,” Cody calls after him as he walks away into the crowd. Noel’s got an inkling of a feeling that was a planned maneuver.

“So where you from, Cody?” Noel’s drunk enough that he can drop the reins and let his inner flirt take over, something that normally takes a lot more conscious effort when he’s sober. He takes a step toward Cody, propping his forearm on the pillar. “SoCal?”

“Canada.”

“Canada! Damn, I can definitely see you pulling a 200-pound sled through a snow-covered forest. Or some other buff wintery-ass shit like that.”

That gets another laugh out of Cody. “I’m from Calgary, not the Alaskan wilderness. It’s an actual city. You know, with people and shit.”

“Riiight. You know, that’s kinda funny. I was actually born in Toronto.”

Cody’s eyes light up. “Seriously? That’s tight. You miss it?”

“Don’t really remember it. We moved around a lot when I was a kid. But I’ve been in LA since I was 17. So you know, I guess I’m allowed to say I’m from here now.”

“Nah. Canada still claims you,” Cody reassures him, lightly brushing a fingertip against Noel’s arm before taking a sip of his drink.

The little drunk devil on Noel’s shoulder is wondering why the fuck they’re still talking. “Hey, you, uh…you wanna dance?”

Cody swallows audibly, his Adam’s apple bobbing with it, and Noel’s only a little ashamed to admit that the sight goes straight to his dick. “Sure, why not. Show me those slick LA moves.”

Noel walks in front of him and Cody follows, his hand moving to Noel’s lower back.

Time to add a fourth item to tonight’s agenda.

* * *

Noel wakes up at the asscrack of dawn on Tuesday and drags himself to school, pulling into the parking lot right at 7:15. He sits in his car for a few minutes after he turns off the ignition, with that gnawing feeling in his stomach like it’s trying to eat itself from the inside out. Saying he’s nervous for the students to show up is a gross, gross understatement. He feels like he’s gonna throw up if a kid even looks in his direction.

Growing up, he was always the type of kid that would be astronomically shitty to substitute teachers just to feel like he had any control over his life. Now karma has made her grand sweeping comeback to bite him hard in the ass, because he’s positive that kids these days give even fewer fucks about teachers’ feelings than they did 15 years ago.

By the time he gets to the tech lab, his stomach hurts even worse and Cody’s already inside, puttering around the cubicles and passing out syllabus packets.

“Hey, good morning.”

Cody looks his way when he hears the door open. “Morning. How you feeling?”

Noel exhales sharply, stepping up onto the platform and setting his briefcase down on his desk. “Scared as shit, man. This was a fuckin’ mistake. I’m in way over my head.”

“Hey, no you’re not. It’s all good.” Cody’s tone is self-assured but soothing, like a therapist. “All we’re doing today is introducing ourselves, giving them a rundown of the syllabus, and then they get to dick around on the computers for the rest of the time. No worries.”

He’s right. Noel has to keep reminding himself that Cody’s running the show, not him. At least not until they get into the coding unit next month.

“Dick around?” he repeats, overdramatically scathing. “You better watch your mouth around those kids.”

Cody rolls his eyes. “Please, I’ve been at this for years. I know how to flip the switch.”

“You ever swear at a kid before?”

“Oh, _all_ the time my first couple years of teaching.”

“Are we talking the F-word, or…”

“The F-word, the S-word, the B-word, the whole alphabet of cuss words.”

“So the N-word too, right?”

“Oh, fuck _off_. No _slurs,_ obviously. This is a school, not a Tarantino film.”

Noel smirks, holding up his hands in joking resignation. “Apologies. Didn’t mean to scorn your good name.”

“That’s what I thought. So yeah, whenever I’d slip up they’d all go ‘Oh my God, Mr. Ko, where’s your filter? I think you lost it again. It’s okay, we can help you look for it!’ And they’d all pretend to search around on the floor and under their backpacks and everything. It was really fucking funny. ‘Round here you’ll learn very quickly that no matter how funny you think you are, kids will always be funnier.”

“See, in all my years trying to break into stand-up, that’s what I really needed to hear all along. Just the right kind of motivation I need to give it up forever.”

Cody busts out laughing, slapping a hand to his chest, and Noel gets treated to those nose crinkles and crow’s feet again. For the first time that day (and, well, ever), he’s consciously aware that Cody has green eyes. True green, too, none of that hazel bullshit that he has himself. They’re nice.

The first bell rings just then, a tinny buzzing sound three times in a row, meaning that students will begin coming in at any moment.

“Go time,” Cody says matter-of-factly, giving Noel a gentle tap on his arm with his fist before heading for the door to unlock it. “Just breathe. They’ll like you, I promise. Just be yourself.”

The pathetic irony of Cody telling Noel to be himself is not lost on him, given the circumstances.

He sits down at his desk, which is still too bare to indicate that he has any semblance of a personality at all, and watches with growing anxiety as the kids file in. They look like most teens that Noel has seen wandering around Santa Monica Beach in the summertime. Some of them are dressed particularly on trend (he spots a couple “VSCO girls” and a few e-boy types), and others look exactly like the average high schooler has looked for decades: jeans, t-shirt, sneakers or sandals. He spots a lot more AirPods than he’d expected.

Most of them give him a questioning look as they take their seats at the cubicle spaces, but thankfully none that make him feel like his mortal soul is being weighed on a scale. For the most part, they seem like they kinda just don’t give a fuck. Maybe he freaked out like a pussy for nothing.

Cody, on the other hand, is the life of the party. He stands at the door and greets every kid by name, and Noel can see their early-morning frowns turn around into smiles in return. They all go for a high five, a fist bump, or at least a timid “Hey Mr. Ko” as they pass through the door.

“Mr. Ko, are we gonna do iMovie again this year?” one tall boy asks as he pulls his rolling chair out from the cubicle spot closest to Noel. He’s in an oversized red hoodie, and his curly hair is flopping all around in his face. He carries himself with the swagger of the class clown. “Santi told me that first period got to make music videos at the end of last year. Are we gonna make music videos?”

Cody doesn’t even look over at the kid as he takes a piece of paper from the girl that just came in. “Well, Andrés, that’s up to you, my friend. Depends on how well you follow the behavior plan this semester.”

Andrés groans dramatically and flops down in his chair, earning snickers from the two boys sitting on either side of him. “Are you _kidding?”_ he whines, letting himself spin at the mercy of the chair’s momentum. “Johnny and Carlos are always talking all the time and you never yell at them.”

“Ay, shut up, man,” one of the friends shoots back lightheartedly, reaching over the cubicle barrier to sock Andrés in the arm. A fake fight ensues, with the third kid looking like he’s itching to get involved too, and Noel’s half delighted by it but also half afraid they’re gonna break something expensive. And Cody’s all the way on the other side of the room, so…

“Hey, you two. Chill out, please.”

All three of the boys freeze, and their heads whip around to stare at Noel, who’s got a feeling that he probably just made a grave mistake.

“Who’re you?” one of the friends asks accusatorially. He’s wearing a cobalt blue short-sleeve with all sorts of Japanese characters on it. Noel only went to Japanese Saturday school for a couple years but he can make out “car,” “picture,” and “water.”

“Hey, that’s no way to greet a guest. That’s Mr. Miller,” Cody calls over at them before Noel can answer. “Now sit quietly and don’t kill each other till the bell rings, ‘kay?”

“What about _after_ the bell rings?” the third kid shouts back with a shit-eating grin on his face. The other two dissolve into hushed chuckles.

Cody stands there with both hands on his hips, piece of paper in one hand, eyebrow raised, looking for all the world like the dad in a cheesy 90’s sitcom. “Carlos.”

Carlos tenses up a little, and even the other two boys wipe the smirks off their faces. “Sorry, Mr. Ko.”

Damn, Noel thinks. He’s never seen any teacher be so good at discipline without being a hardass. It’s easy to see now why the kids like him so much.

Cody catches his eye from across the room just then, flashing him a tiny smile before checking his watch and closing the door. It clicks shut right as the second bell goes off.

“Okay, welcome back, team,” Cody chirps as he makes his way back towards the desk platform. He stands on the floor in front of it, facing the cubicle floor. “Happy senior year!” That’s met with a mixture of whoops and boos from the students. “Oh come on, y’all, what’s wrong? _Senior year!_ You’re finally the big guys on campus!”

“I’m not going to college,” Andrés blurts out, and the rest of the kids laugh. He’s grinning with the satisfaction of winning over his audience. Noel knows the feeling very well.

“I didn’t ask you about college, did I?” Cody shoots back with an even tone, and Andrés mimes zipping his mouth shut and throwing away the key. “Well, regardless of your college plans or lack thereof, it’s great to have you back in tech lab. We’re gonna have a great time this year. Mr. Miller and I have a lot of awesome new units planned for you guys. And no, Andrés, iMovie isn’t one of them…yet.”

A girl sitting at the furthest cubicle back shoots her hand up. She’s wearing a shirt with a K-pop band on it.

“Yes, Olivia?”

“Is Mr. Miller our new teacher?”

“Ding ding ding,” Cody confirms, turning back and gesturing towards Noel. Noel’s not entirely sure what to do in the spotlight, so he just kind of forces a closed-tooth smile. “After however many years of me asking the school very very nicely, we finally have a computer expert who’s gonna help us learn, drum roll please…” The students all start slamming their hands on their desks until Cody cuts them off with a choir conductor’s wave. “Coding!”

Noel could sink into the floor and die right then and there. But the class erupts into excitement, particularly from the Comedy Club up front.

“Can you teach us how to hack into the Matrix?” Andrés asks, almost like he’s daring Noel to have a reaction. That earns some more laughter from the class.

Noel steals a hesitant look at Cody, looking for confirmation of what to do, but Cody just raises his eyebrows at him.

“Uh…nah, it’s not like that. But we’re gonna learn how to make some cool programs. Like apps, basically. It’s gonna be fun.”

Andrés seems satisfied with that answer, turning back around in his chair. Noel allows himself to breathe a little sigh of relief.

The rest of the period passes quickly as Cody runs down the syllabus with the class, and Noel almost jumps out of his chair when the bell rings. Jesus, is he really that on edge?

Cody comes up to join him on the platform after he sends the class off. “What’d you think?”

“Not bad. Kinda fun, actually. That Andrés is a real pain in the ass, huh?”

“You feel my struggle now.”

“Sure do. He’s funny, though. Reminds me a lot of me at that age.”

Cody gives him a look, but he’s amused. “Why does that not surprise me?”

“What can I say? I was a dick. Now I’m still a dick, but I know how to be a functioning member of society somewhat.”

“Debatable.” He gives Noel a little up-down glance, and that tugging feeling on his ribs is back. “You did great, man. Didn’t even throw up or anything.”

“I know, I’m just as shocked as you.”

Neither of them says anything for a beat or two, but it feels like someone _should_ be saying something. Or like something should be happening.

Cody breaks first. “You ready for second period?”

“I guess I don’t have a choice.”

“Well, these are freshman, so they’re the polar opposite of our first class. Insecure as fuck, worried sick about all the wrong things, not entirely sure how school works yet.”

Noel breaks out a catlike grin as he watches Cody realize he walked right into that one. “Oh sick, dude, I didn’t know I was on the roster this semester.”


End file.
